The Avenger.

 

 

I was driving down a highway in the mid-west of the United States of America – travelling south, but that doesn’t matter. The road was long and straight, narrowing to a fine point as I tried to see the end of it in front of me. A hazy shimmering of heat moved an ethereal dance from the concrete and tarmac. To the sides of the road were flat fields, some having corn, that opened out as far as my eyes could see. The sky was pale blue and set high with no smudge or hint of clouds, and stillness hovered over the whole scene that made it feel as if I was driving through a representation of reality.

Leaning forward in my seat, I momentarily glanced in the rear view mirror, noticing the sweat on my tanned forehead. My eyes stared at my reflection and I looked at the little mirror picture of Jesus Christ that hung by a fine thread from the rear view mirror. I opened the glove compartment to check its contents, and satisfied with what I saw closed the glove compartment door and settled in my seat as I continued to drive. In my own way I was enjoying the peace because the car was silent. I had turned the music off, and having had it on loud for a couple of hours it left a slight buzzing in my ears. I had passed a fuel station about ten minutes earlier on; it wasn’t a large concern, meaning one that was part of a known franchise or whatever. It was small and looked as though it was run by a person or a family, with just a few pumps to feed the metal mouths of the conveyance machines with poisonous liquid. I saw one of the inhabitants of the machines paying money for the noxious energy juice before slotting back in place on the concrete runway. Five minutes before the fuel station I passed a small homestead that was separate from a farm. A scripture from the Christian Bible was written on a hoarding by the side of the house – yellow, grey and blue – they were the only colours that I could see – but I also saw an area to pull into by the side of the road, and already parked there was a large bulky car of a style that has gained such popularity nowadays.

I slowed down and saw that the vehicle looked like a family car. A flat back pickup would be more the kind of vehicle used by people who make their living working on the land. This was a family excursion.

I glided silently behind the parked car, having turned the ignition key to OFF a little way back so that I could freewheel to a stop. I sat there, letting the car settle, listening to the pings of metal cooling and flakes of rust or mud fall away – or whatever it is that makes that sound when a car stops after a long drive.

I opened the driver’s door, allowing the heat to spill into the car – the sun was hot on my bare arm and it burned through my jeans onto the skin of my leg. Silence was the only sound.

I listened to the sound of nothing, but of course there was sound – it was it’s sound, which is made up of a backdrop of insects and small creatures that inhabiteth the earth, their calling and movement making the noise that we sense as there being nothing – and a gunshot explosion banged out a hard thud of a sound that was in conflict to the quietness, shattering a harmony that until that time existed, and small birds that were previously unseen sprang from where they were, taking flight in fear, and so to the sound of other small animals, scurrying to what they believed, and hoped, was away from the thing that frightened them so. For they are ignorant of thought, but equal in feeling fear and pain as the humans do.

The wiliness of the human kind mind had laid what they call a trap, and the small animals in their burst of fright ran into the very thing that they were trying to escape from, because they were the victim of a planned ruse – in this case, I was soon to discover, was designed and implemented by a man and child, who I took to be father and son – and they did trick the small animals who did run blindly into the shot from the barrel of a gun that let forth another explosion, but one of the scurrying animals who had heard the first bang, did not hear that second bang, because he or she had been shot dead, the first shot killing a small animal, and the human mind knowing it would cause other small animals to run in the opposite direction into the path and aim of the other human, who did point the barrel of his gun, and thus did pull the trigger and set forth an explosion that resulted in the bloodied body of the small animal, who seconds earlier was unknowingly contributing to the sound of nothing.

I looked into the car, which without doubt was owned by the people shooting animals. Stickers on the windows expressed that particular family’s interests, mainly about outdoor pursuits and a supposedly humorous sticker about computers. There was a prominent sticker about being a Christian and the name of a church where they go – above the number plate on the rear of the vehicle was a sticker with a cartoon type of drawing depicting a small animal with an innocent looking face, and unknown to this small animal is the barrel of a gun pointing at the side of his head, and next to the drawing were the words: ‘It might not be your day, but it sure is mine.’

 The inside of the car was bundled and untidy. A private vessel of material wastage, with discarded clothes, computer games, food, magazines and an assortment of things to amuse the people who owned the vehicle.

I went back to my car, mindful to be quiet because I didn’t want to disturb the people shooting, knowing it was more than one by the different sounds of gunshot. I opened the glove compartment in my car and took out what I needed to take out to make a pleasant afternoon, and then I made my way back to the side of the car with the stickers. I was quiet, real quiet, as I knelt down by the side of their car and waited, knowing those that fired the guns would soon be emerging out of the tall corn – and I heard voices, an adult and boy child, with the man talking about clearing their guns of cartridges as they went about picking up the dead small animals and laughing about their torn and damaged appearance. The human father was, in his own way, teaching his son the ways of safety, and this was a family outing with the father and son, bonding, as they, or some, say – and there they were, breached guns held loosely, pointed down at the ground with the young human boy tossing the bloody body of the small animal down on the dried soil and the father following suit, only he threw the small broken body high into air, back in the direction from where they had walked – and as they reached the car I stood up – wearing rabbit ears on my head and on my nose a little furry bob with whiskers coming from it – and I must confess, I know it’s naughty, but I had the biggest and probably the stupidest and most simple of grins on my face – and they did stop and stare, with the human boy letting out a gasp, for in my hand was an Uzi machine gun.

‘Got a message from Briar and Bugs,’ I said as I squeezed the trigger while pointing the gun at the face of human boy.

The effect was torn flesh and bone splintering and splattering until there was no boy face at all – and I walked up to the body, keeping an eye on father of boy who just stared down at the faceless and dead boy son of his, and I looked at father human and said. ‘Mysterious ways – He works in mysterious ways,’ and then I said, ‘O Lord, the God who avenges’ ‘Rise up, o Judge of the Earth; pay back to the proud what they deserve.’ (Psalms. 94.1,2.)

And just as the human father made a move for running right at me I stopped my pleasant manner, and I stood upright, for this messenger had tired of the man, and I squeezed the trigger, letting forth the flow of brass instrumentation that will always play their serenade of death as they pierce, gouge and shatter living bodies – and they did indeed take the living breath from this human man, and he fell, at first falling forward, but the force of the little brass brutes knocked him backwards with such power and speed he was unable to release what it was that he was going to shout or cry out – and he fell with his head nearly touching the corpse of the small animal that his son had murdered earlier, when they were both alive and laughing, which was no time at all, but it might as well had been for ever.

But, I did not stay around to make a detailed study of the situation. Jumping into my car, because I was moving at a pace. I put my ears, nose and gun in the glove compartment, started the engine and drove off – and not knowing why, I honked the horn as I passed their car – moving away – and moving and drifting is something that I do.